Alexandr peered over her shoulder. "I am no great chemist," he said, "but I will guess that this is a type of fuel. Rocket fuel, perhaps?"
"That would make sense," Nina agreed. "If the admiral's father was at Peenemünde and then transferred down here, it seems likely that he was involved with either aeronautics or ballistics. These here are army documents, just like the ones I've seen before — and they're in the same kind of code. Now, let's have a look at this." She picked up the notebook and opened it to a random page. Sam saw a look of puzzlement cross her face. "Ok, it says… It shall be the greatest of adventures… Worthy of Holmes, of Nemo, of Doctor Moreau…" Her face was white as she shut the book. "Purdue, where did you get this?"
Purdue faced her calmly. "I have a wide range of sources, Nina. When I began to prepare for this expedition I asked a few associates of mine to obtain material like this for me, at any price. Why do you ask? Is it something I'm not supposed to have?"
"This notebook…" Nina paused, confused, searching for a solution in her head. "This notebook belongs to Sam, by rights. This is one of the notebooks that was stolen from me after he gave it to me to translate. Who did you get it from?"
"I'm afraid I can't remember off the top of my head," Purdue said dismissively. "I do keep a database of these things, but as you can imagine I would struggle to check it just now. Once we return to Scotland I shall find out who supplied it and see if I can trace the thief, all right? Will that do?"
Nina nodded, but Sam could read the suspicion on her face. She was not happy with Purdue's explanation and neither, in truth, was he. When he said he had sources who had told him about Nina's funding application, I thought he meant other people in her department, Sam thought. Did he know about all this before she even applied? What the hell is going on here? And why the hell am I in the same tent as Admiral Whitsun?
The academics continued to pore over the evidence for a while and eventually concluded that the papers and the notebook corroborated each other on the likely existence of the ice station and its coordinates. The admiral's father had had a map in his pocket, which looked like nothing more than a few squiggles at first glance, but on closer inspection revealed markings indicating all the topographic features of the area and the location of something marked "W" with a few scrawled numbers around it. The numbers correlated to the coordinates Nina had pulled from the notebook. When they realized this, most of the group gasped, but Purdue sat smugly, certain that the evidence was in his favor.
"For me, that's sufficient evidence to justify investigating," said Nina. "But that's just me. Judging by these coordinates and the map, we wouldn't have to cross the mountains or even enter the mountain range. The entrance is marked as being right at the edge, about a kilometer from our current location. Having come this far, I would hate to turn back without having checked out whether this place is real and whether we can find it. But I can only make a decision for myself, not the rest of you. So I suggest we put it to a vote. There are nine of us. Shall we say that more than six counts as a majority? Is everyone happy to go with a majority vote? Or should we agree that if it's not unanimous we proceed with the original plan as most of us understood it and go straight to Neumayer IV?"
"I'm not exactly thrilled either way," said Fatima, "but I trust most of you to have some sense of self-preservation. If there's a majority vote in favor, I'm happy with that. I just don't want to be dragged off on the whim of one maniac."
Once Fatima had spoken, no one else spoke up against the idea of a majority vote. Nina asked those in favor of looking for the ice station to raise their hands, then counted herself, Sam, Purdue, Blomstein, Admiral Whitsun, Jefferson Daniels, and Alexandr Arichenkov.
"Those against?"
Fatima and Professor Matlock raised their hands. Alexandr offered to contact Neumayer and ask that the two dissenters be collected and taken to safety before the rest of the group began their hunt, but they both declined.
"I'm staying in case you need me," Fatima said.
"I am just making my feelings known," said Matlock. "If — or when — this expedition comes to a sticky end, I would like us all to remember at the last that I, at least, was not in favor of it."
Chapter 14
It took another day for the snowstorm to calm down and allow the expedition to proceed. Sam woke on the fifth morning in the tent to the unfamiliar sound of silence — no howling wind, no delicate flutter of falling snow. The quietness seemed strange, almost unnerving after spending so long in a shrieking gale.
He did not realize how early it was until he noticed that the others were all still bundled up in their sleeping bags. Only Alexandr was up and moving about, and he was unzipping the inner door and making his way out of the tent. Sam caught a glimpse of the satellite phone in his hand. He must be going outside to get a signal, Sam thought. He vaguely remembered something Purdue had said about the phone requiring open sky to work. Sam burrowed back down into his sleeping bag, rubbing his chilly feet together for warmth.
A few moments later Alexandr returned. Sam was drowsy, but not yet fully asleep. He half-opened his eyes to see Alexandr shaking Purdue's shoulder to wake him up. They had a brief, rapid conversation in whispers, then Purdue wriggled out of his sleeping bag, grabbed the snowsuit that was neatly folded beside him and quickly pulled it on. The two men headed back outside. Ziv Blomstein rolled onto his side, his eyes open, watching and listening for any sign of danger to Purdue.
Sam dozed again, and had no idea how long it was before he woke again. By the time he opened his eyes, several of the others were awake and dressed, and Jefferson Daniels was making coffee on the burner. Sam had never liked coffee, but the smell was amazing and when it came to hot drinks, he would take what he could get out here.
Because his cigarette consumption had been cut so drastically, he found himself turning to caffeine to compensate. He dragged himself out of the sleeping bag and began to pull his clothes on over his thermal underwear. I could do with a shower, he thought, accidentally catching the scent of his own unwashed body. If we find this ice station, I hope it somehow has hot water. He could only imagine how bad the tent would smell to someone walking into it for the first time, because none of the expedition members had been able to have more than a sponge bath since they left the ship.
"Good morning!" Nina trilled, seeing that he was awake. It was her turn to make the rounds that morning, doling out breakfast sachets and hot water. "And what would sir like for breakfast this rather fine morning? We have porridge with blueberries, porridge with strawberries, butter flavored scrambled eggs, or scrambled eggs with potato and mixed peppers. Which would you prefer? All equally high-fat, high-protein, and lacking in any kind of flavor or deliciousness."
"How come they don't have just porridge-flavored porridge?" Sam asked. "Normal porridge that I can put a wee bit of salt in. Why does everything have to have berries in it?"
"We're stuck in a tent in Antarctica and you're complaining about the food being too luxurious?" Nina ripped open a sachet of porridge with strawberries. "The berries are to stop you from getting scurvy."
"Whisky would stop me from getting scurvy. I'm sure I read that somewhere."
"Probably in an article you'd written yourself." She poured hot water on the freeze-dried oats and handed the sachet to Sam before moving on to offer the breakfast selection to Admiral Whitsun.